


Lancer

by mird



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: Republic Commando Series - Karen Traviss, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Clone Troopers Speak Mando'a (Star Wars), Clone Wars, Clones, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Espionage, Feels, Gen, Gray Jedi (Star Wars), Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Mandalorian Clone Troopers (Star Wars), Mando'a, Missing Scene, Nonbinary Character, Nonbinary Clone Troopers (Star Wars), Order 66 Aftermath (Star Wars), Pre-Order 66 (Star Wars), Slow Burn, Spies & Secret Agents, Trans Clone Troopers (Star Wars)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-24
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:07:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,986
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26087674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mird/pseuds/mird
Summary: On receipt of urgent orders to redirect to Utapau, clone intelligence unit Lancer is abruptly thrust onto a mission of great consequence - one that will only raise more questions about their future.In Revenge of the Sith, Palpatine tells Anakin that "clone intelligence units have discovered the location of General Grievous". The question of who or what Clone Intelligence is - and how they found Grievous - was the inspiration for this fic, but the story quickly transformed into a reflection on the state of the soldiers still fighting in the final days of the war.
Kudos: 2





	1. All Stop

> **SCRAMBLE LINE ENCRYPTED, SECURITY CLEARANCE BLACK.**
> 
> **STAND BY STAND BY.**
> 
> **TARABBA SECTOR FORWARD LISTENING POST TO STAR DESTROYER THUNDERER.**
> 
> **ALL STOP. ALL STOP. CORUSCANT FLEET CONTROL ORDERS IMMEDIATE COURSE REDIRECT TO TARABBA SECTOR. REPEAT, IMMEDIATE COURSE REDIRECT TARABBA SECTOR. THUNDERER INSTRUCTED TO RUN SILENT AT MAXIMUM SPEED. NO STOPS, NO COMMS. PROCEED DIRECTLY TO RENDEZVOUS WITH CRUISER ANNO PATHFINDER AT ATTACHED COORDINATES. REPEAT, RENDEZVOUS WITH ANNO PATHFINDER. RUN SILENT, MAX SPEED, NO STOPS, NO COMMS.**
> 
> **PROCEED WITH PRIORITY EXTRACTION FROM KARIDEPH EN ROUTE AND PREP MISSION CRITICAL RESOURCES FOR INTELLIGENCE UNIT LANCER. REPEAT, LANCER MISSION CRITICAL.**
> 
> **THAT IS ALL. OUT.**

**LAAT/i _Triple Ugly_ , in transit from Karideph surface to intercept Venator-class Star Destroyer _Thunderer_ in geostationary orbit. 1700 hours, four days before the end of the war.**

The hull plates of the larty rattled and shuddered, even after it left atmosphere. The lurching craft had seen better days; it had been present at the start of the war, and soon its passengers would see its end. Despite its many deep cleans since that fateful first battle, red Geonosian sand still tumbled around in the gunship’s underbelly, still choking its subsystems. The once white plasteel furnishings of the gunship had long been rubbed grey and beige.

The two men in its hold were much quieter than the ship itself, though. As the red cabin light switched to white, indicating they had entered space proper, they remained still. There was a certain mood in the recycled air, though neither of them could find the words to describe it. Not that either of them would have expressed such a feeling openly anyway. These men - these clones - had mixed feelings about the war...but sharing those feelings was not the done thing.

Eventually one of them spoke up.

“Hey Belt,” he said, holding onto a grab-handle to steady himself, “What d’ya think the chances are that Sib will have another poem for us when we get back?”

“Beyond certain,” replied his brother, not looking up from his datapad.

“Think they’ll give us a reading?”

“Also likely.”

“Don’t ya think it’s strange, though?”

“Roamer...aren’t you tired of asking that?”

"It’s just odd, you know? How many brothers do you know that write? It’s not natural.”

“You only think that because you’ve not got a creative bone in your body.”

"If that’s true, neither do you.”

"Creativity is what sets us above clankers. It’s you that’s the anomaly, not Sib.”

The standing clone huffed. Despite the man’s gruff appearance, he knew when an argument was lost. And though he pretended to be puzzled by his absent sibling’s unusual talents, he appreciated them deep down. His confusion was performative - more a defense of his own self-doubt than anything else. Without the war, he - like all clones - wouldn’t have existed. All their lives, they had been soldiers - and damn good soldiers, at that. But now the sieges in the Outer Rim were winding down, and in an explosion of violence back on Coruscant, the Separatists had been cut off at the head. Only one thing - one twisted bastard - stood between the Republic and victory: General Grievous. Once he was eliminated, Roamer knew, the question of what was to come after the war would be the only question worth asking. And that scared him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay! posting so that the pressure is on to complete it! this opening chapter is a sort of teaser - it was the first scene I wrote and is more or less the nugget around which the rest of the fic has started growing. right now it accounts for <10% of what I have written, but it's a nice little junk to gauge interest before I start releasing the rest of it.
> 
> tune in next time for more on Sib, Lancer's nonbinary 'poet pilot' mentioned by Belt, as well as an introduction to their leader, big ol softboy commando Captain Hash!


	2. Ribbons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lancer begins preparations for their mission, as tension on Utapau rises.

**Starboard bridge of the _Thunderer_ ; 1816 hours, four days before the end of the war.**

Beyond the angled windows of the star destroyer’s bridge, the clouds on the planet below slowly drifted towards Karideph’s horizon. Assembled around the holotable in the aft section, the vessel’s senior staff remained quiet as a young, robed Cathar spoke.

“...yes, yes. Captain Sarne was concerned about the potential for that kind of interference, but in my meetings with the elders they expressed nothing but a desire for peace. More than anything, they are grateful to be so far removed from the conflict.”

The ship’s commander, Admiral Du-Yelhsa, nodded along with his arms crossed and the crook of his finger perched over his chin. The man was older, with greying hair, but had the bulk of a man half his age. It was clear, just from the mood of the room, that he had a soft spot for the young Jedi that spoke. The girl’s name was Zelhom Mar, and no-one had been brave enough to ask her age; she was barely a teenager and, despite her maturity and unusually senior rank, her youth was still palpable. But Du-Yelhsa’s stern focus on the girl kept the older men in the room in line.

Besides the Admiral and his executive officer, Baarden Kumo, all the other men on the bridge were clones. Dressed in a mix of naval uniforms and white-and-teal armour, the same face repeated around the edge of the room, hovering in the shadows. Beside General Mar stood a clone by the name of Bod. His rank insignia - an old-fashioned four dots under his pauldron - identified him as a commander.

The Admiral offered the Jedi a smile.

“So the survey was a success, it seems. Well done, General.” 

The Cathar smiled back. “I think so,” she replied.

“I’m sure you're eager to give your report to the council...” the Admiral said softly, then turned to the rest of the room, "...we’ll be able to transmit as soon as we’re able to link to the Republic comm buoy at Elrood. So helm, please give us ahead full."

One of the clone officers nearest the bow doors nodded and slipped through onto the flight deck to begin barking orders. Du-Yelhsa turned to the shadows and beckoned forth one of the men standing there. At that, Kumo stepped forward to address the room; he was a squat, red-faced man but his voice was commanding.

“All officers are hereby instructed to stand by for new orders pending our arrival at Elrood. In the meantime, there is one more item of business. At this point we require all personnel lacking code cylinders with black clearance to leave the room. This matter is security clearance _black._ I say again, if you do not have black-clearance code cylinders, you are now dismissed. Thank you gentlemen.”

As Kumo spoke, the rank-and-file began to dutifully filter out of the room and the clone beckoned by Du-Yelhsa made his way to the centre console. Wearing the advanced armour of the Grand Army’s special commando units, Captain Hash was a rare sight and could not have been mistaken for a part of the ship’s standard personnel. His armour, unlike that of his brothers, was decorated so completely with complex patterns that it obscured any shade of the white plastoid beneath. No colour identified him as part of Commander Bod’s regiment, either.

Zelhom Mar remained at the holotable, and as the commando approached, he gave her an upward nod of respect. There was something as instantly disarming about the man as there was about Mar’s youth; his hair was far longer than other clones, and something about his features was softer, like the edges had been sanded off.

“General, I...” Hash began, but was interrupted by a curt wave of Du-Yelhsa’s hand.

The admiral leaned over and, putting his mouth beside Mar’s ear, mumbled discreetly.

“Oh...oh, I’m sorry Admiral...Captain...” the girl stammered as the admiral pulled away; she looked between the two men, “I’ve not encountered this level of security clearance before...I just assumed I had it. Please, excuse me.”

She turned to Bod, and the commander promptly led her toward the aft elevator.

“Quite alright,” Hash replied, turning to meet her curious gaze as the child passed him.

“I like your armour,” she said, pausing for a moment to examine the detailing, “...you don’t see many of Bod’s men painting such intricate designs...welcome to the ship, Captain.”

“Thank you, General...for the welcome and for your compliment,” Hash replied, “It’s an honour to meet you. It sounds like your mission on Kal'Shebbol went well; perhaps you could tell me more about it in the mess later.”

The girl seemed a little surprised by the offer, and hesitated a moment before returning with a smile, “I’d be more than happy to. Thank you. May the force be with you.”

“May the force be with _you_ , General.”

As the young Jedi left the room, the last couple bridge officers trickled out to the crew pits in the bow section. The officers remaining in the briefing room were just Hash, Du-Yelhsa and Kumo. Kumo wordlessly went to the door control panel and punched the blast doors at either end of the room closed.

“Cee-cee dash two-one-eight-two,” Du-Yelhsa said, “Welcome aboard. I take it your two late arrivals from Karideph are settled?”

The Captain centred his weight, and clasped his hands in front of him.

“Aye, sir. Probably making a nuisance of themselves in the mess by now. But you have my word that our presence won’t affect your operations beyond that.”

“I’m afraid, Captain, that starship has already launched. We’ve received new orders.”

Kumo appeared at Hash’s side, hand outstretched.

“Your cylinder, please.”

The XO took the cylinders of both men and, along with his own, inserted them into a nearby security console.

“Do you encounter many black-level clearance codes, Admiral?” asked Hash. 

“This is the flagship of the two-hundred-eighty-second, Captain. We conduct search operations, remote diplomatic missions and planetary surveys. We have _never_ received a black-clearance order.”

The mood in the room sharply turned.

Hash shifted his tone, “And you’ve not opened this transmission until now?”

“We opened it on receipt, but it contains specific instructions for your unit. Given the clearance and despite the urgency, we thought it best to wait until all of Lancer was on board to relay the message.”

Kumo finished configuring the security console and indicated to his superior that the message was ready to be displayed. 

"Go ahead, main holoscreen," ordered the Admiral. And with the clunking turn of a switch, in a fizzle of blue light, there it was: _all stop, all stop._ Orders to move quickly to an asteroid cluster near the Utapau system. _Lancer mission critical._ Though none of the men in the room knew it yet, the importance of the mission was monumental. Hash considered the message carefully, re-reading it several times before solemnly nodding.

With another clunk of the switch, the hologram fizzled out and silence took over the room.

* * *

****Operations room, IGV-55 surveillance vessel** **_Anno Pathfinder_ ** **, Skustell Cluster; dawn shift.** **

"Confirm IPT alert. Target is transmitting. Confirm the interferometer array has receipt."

"Index is marginal, interlock sequence engaged."

“Connection intercept established. Start the clock. All stations switch comm to tac-three."

"Be advised, signal interference from the neighbouring gas giant is high.”

“Recalibrate azimuth sweep angle."

"Do we have a passive signature imprint?"

The darkened room was abuzz with chatter. At consoles, arranged on steps leading up to a central command desk, clones sat facing toward a holo-screen that covered the far wall. Each of them represented an individual component of a complex machine, parsing and responding to an array of data as it streamed in from the ship’s instruments.

At the top of the dimly lit room, at the command desk, sat a clone equipped with a cybernetic construct. His head was shaven and, below the waist, his legs had been replaced with prosthetics. The controller had once been a signals officer, assigned to the 91st Recon Corps for most of the war - now, he was a critical component of this machine. The installation of his construct had been voluntary - he had no qualms about the way that his augmentation constricted his thoughts to specific channels of logic, turned him more machine than man. He was focused. And propelled by a desire to see the war end as quickly as possible.

And now, he and his crew had come as close as they ever would to changing the course of galactic history. They had intercepted a data packet from Utapau.

“Processing main sequence data. Decryption, what is your status?” asked the controller.

An underling at a desk down below replied, “Receiving. Crypto-matrix engaged.”

Reams of data scrolled across the screen faster than a swoop-bike. A series of interlocking symbols rotated in the corner as the ship’s powerful computers processed the Utapaun signal and translated it into parsable information.

The chorus of almost-identical voices harmonised as the man-machine worked.

“Diplomatic packet. Electronic signature of one Lampay Fay, identify please.”

“Packet header identifies source as the Port Administration office at Pau City, message intended for the Coruscant embassy.”

“Do not jam. Relay the signal - let’s not spook anyone back home.”

“Message signatory identified - Lampay Fay, senior aide to the Chairman of the Utapaun Committee, Tion Medon.”

“Message comes from Medon’s office, sent by Fay as an appointed proxy.”

“Decryption?”

“Working...stand by. Stand by.”

The main holoscreen switched to display a waveform visualisation, and at the command of the controller, an audio file began to play. What trickled out of the speakers was illegible - the crew heard nothing but bassy hissing sounds - a language completely unknown to all but one of them.

Their interpreter - a first-generation clone by the name of Snider - suddenly became the focus of all the men in the room. With his eyes closed in concentration, he made a series of hurried strokes on his touch-board, recording in note form the meaning of the strange Utapese speech. The voice was that of Medon, speaking in his native tongue - indicating that the message was intended for a Pau’an member of the embassy staff back on Coruscant.

The room went quiet as the interpreter worked. Simultaneously, a stenographer and a transcriptionist worked to record the message, even as a copy of the audio was transferred directly to the ship’s data tapes.

After a few tense moments, Medon’s message suddenly halted with a final, clipped hiss. Even to the clones in the room who did not speak Utapese, what had happened was clear.

“Signal interference.”

“Can we regain the connection?”

“Negative. Data stream tapering off - the transmission was cut at the source.”

“Signal break pattern?”

“Consistent with a jamming device, sir.”

The controller leaned forward in his chair, making eye contact with the interpreter as the man at the lower desk turned round to face him.

“Report?”

“Sir...the chairman seemed to be talking in a sort of...code. He talked about his recent purchase of a painting by an artist named Ryach Ur - which the embassy on Coruscant is to collect and send via courier back to Pau City. But the tones are off - it may be a coded dialect I’m not familiar with.”

The controller weighed the new information for a moment, then leaned back in his chair. A partial message was nothing to go on - but there was a reason they were monitoring communications from this particular backwater world.

Having been assigned to this sector for most of the war, the _Pathfinder_ had paid little attention to Utapau since a brief incursion by Separatist forces earlier that year. Utapau was, as far as was scrutable, a victimised neutral planet - one which had made repeated pleas to the Senate to remain unburdened by the war. Consequently, surveillance efforts in its sector had previously been focused elsewhere. But after the recent battle at Coruscant, the mission of espionage vessels like the _Pathfinder_ had quickly shifted from passive monitoring to active surveillance. All across the galaxy, instead of quietly reporting fleet movements or projecting new battlelines, their objective was now to aggressively pursue intelligence that might lead them to locating members of the Separatist leadership. The new strategy, spearheaded by the Chancellor himself, had, until this point, been largely unsuccessful.

That was until just under forty-eight hours ago, when the air wing of the newly-established Republic listening post at Tarabba Prime - the _Pathfinder’s_ relay station - had engaged a Separatist patrol group above the moon of a neighbouring planet. The fighting had been short and decisive, resulting in the complete destruction of an entire squadron of Republic heavy reconnaissance starfighters. After the battle, the mystery attacking force had disappeared as quickly as it had appeared.

After a panicked series of alert signals, the junior officer left in charge of the listening post had organised a search and rescue detail to retrieve men, materiel and intelligence from the wreckage of the battle - a veritable graveyard of debris scattered across the surface of a grey moon. Miraculously, the flight leader’s black box had been recovered and, upon analysis, it revealed a crucial piece of information: it identified one of the attacking craft as a Belbullab-22 starfighter.

On its own, the presence of that particular kind of ship was not remarkable - the Belbullab line was both commercially available and in wide use by the Hutt cartels, who had been known to collaborate with the Confederacy in the past. And though the presence of top-of-the-line droid tri-fighters in the craft’s attack formation was concerning, what was of more interest to clone intelligence was their ability to cross-reference sightings of a lone craft of its type as far back as the Battle of Geonosis. The brass suspected that it was _Soulless One_ , nicknamed _Spineless One_ by the grunts. The personal ship of General Grievous.

The ship was rarely sighted, and usually, as its nickname suggested, only in retreat. If it was Grievous, then it was particularly unusual for the ship to have ventured out that far without a carrier group. Historically, Grievous had preferred to travel at the heart of a fleet, aboard a heavily armed dreadnought - but since the loss of his flagship, the _Invisible Hand,_ over Coruscant, then perhaps, it was speculated, the general had reason to travel light.

And so it fell to the crew of the _Anno Pathfinder_ to pursue leads pertaining to Utapau and the origin of the anomalous ship. As their technical readouts had told them, the Belbullab-22 possessed a powerful hyperdrive as-standard, meaning it could have come from - or have gone - practically anywhere in the galaxy. But signs of distress on Utapau, when placed in the web of connections mapped out in the cybernetic brain of the _Pathfinder’s_ controller, were significantly more alarming than they would normally seem. To investigate the trail further, though, the crew of the _Pathfinder_ would need to turn the operation over to a ground team.

Over the next few hours, the ship would continue its monitoring of the distant planet’s hyperwave communications in an effort to provide Lancer with as much intelligence data as possible. And then, provided their mission went smoothly, the war would be over.

* * *

**E-deck mess hall, the** **_Thunderer;_ ** **1848 hours.**

Belt and Roamer were the only two clones left in the mess hall. There were a couple non-clone officers, as well as some Ithorian staffers from the delegation to Kal'Shebbol, but still it was easy enough for Hash to find his two men sitting atop opposite tables in their under-armour body gloves.

“Where’s Sib?” asked the captain.

“In the barracks. _Kaysh tayl'ud,_ ” replied Belt, switching to the language of their Mandalorian trainers for a moment to communicate the state of their absent squadmate.

“Well, go wake them up.”

Belt looked across to his brother on the opposite table, but Roamer simply avoided his gaze, flicked a koja nut up into the air and caught it in his mouth.

“Go on then,” said the party-trickster, chewing. As Belt rolled his eyes, acquiesced and dropped down from the table, Hash sat down with a sigh, carefully placing his helmet next to him on the bench.

“Be gentle with them. It’s not urgent. Yet.”

Belt paused, sensing the unease in his commander’s voice.

“New orders, cap?” he asked.

“Yeah, kid. New orders. No rest for the wicked.”

Roamer joined in, asking “What’s the job?” and scoffing a handful of nuts.

Hash dropped his voice to answer in a lower register, lest the others in the mess heard him.

“Don’t know yet. Code black. We’re mission critical.”

“ _Code black?_ ” Roamer was not so subtle, earning him a salty look from Belt.

“Not even General Mar knows. So keep it quiet.”

“Why would they keep orders from the Jedi?” asked Belt, puzzled.

“Not a question for us to ask.”

Despite its asking, the three of them took a moment to sit with the question, each of their identical but divergent brains trying to process an answer. None had one.

“Wake Sib and help them start prepping. Kumo’s given us one of the aft hangar bays. Set up there. Quartermaster’s been told to give us whatever we ask for.”

“Within reason?” Roamer grinned.

“Within reason. No personal E-webs. I want all magseals checked, weapons ready...and scrub your filters. ETA in eight hours, so step on it, please.”

“You think Roamer could carry an E-web all by himself?” Belt sniggered as he walked off towards the barracks “...not these days - he’s going soft.”

Roamer shouted back an insult, “ _Di’kut!_ ” but received only a waved hand in response.

Hash looked around the room again, remembering his promise to the young Jedi in the briefing room. The remaining officers had left, and now so had the Ithorians. Presumably she’d been and gone. He was roused by his brother’s question.

“What are _we_ doing then, Cap?”

“Intel. We’re going to the Tarabba sector, rendezvousing with a ship called the Anno Pathfinder. We’ll need whatever information we can get on both”

“D-deck comp lab?”

“Sure.”

Hash took a deep breath and, with Roamer taking that as a signal to move, the two men rose.

“At least if we’re busy Sib won’t be reading us another poem.”

Hash shook his head, “Roamer, you’ve gotta stop this.”

The slightly-younger clone baulked at his superior’s barbed response.

“I-...”

They stood alone in the deserted mess hall. Hash stepped forward.

“Listen, Roamer. You’re not kidding anyone. You have the same troubles as Sib - we all do. We’re kin. I know how you feel. You know how Sib feels. Hell, you two were the same batch, right? You came up together.”

“But-...”

Hash put his hand on his brother’s shoulder.

“And Sib knows how you feel, Roamer. You should talk to them. Stop this bravado.”

There was another moment of silence before Hash continued.

“If you want it as an order, I’ll make it an order. But we need to be together on this one.”

Back to silence. Hash’s hand stayed on Roamer’s shoulder.

Roamer stared at the ground.

“Agh...I’m sorry, Cap...I’m just so-...”

“Captain!” interrupted a young voice from behind them.

The two men turned their heads to see the young Jedi, Zelhom Mar, throw her arms up in greeting as she entered the cavernous room.

“I’m so glad to have caught you! I had thought you’d be long gone,” she said cheerily.

Hash turned around fully and bowed his head.

“General. I thought I’d missed _you_.”

The Jedi made her way over to the tables, still smiling until she took notice of the clones’ look of surprise.

“Oh...I’m sorry Captain - am I interrupting?”

“Not at all, General. Just chatter.”

The teenager brushed her forehead, “Are you sure? Only I was still hoping to have our dinner chat...”

She craned her neck to look toward the kitchen, where a smattering of apronned clones still worked behind a windowed slit.

“...only I’m not sure they’re still serving,” she said disappointedly.

“Ah, I’m sure they’ll still find something for us,” replied Hash, “I’ll have a word.”

The clone turned back to his comrade and clapped his shoulder, “Go on, Roamer,” he said, “I’ll catch up with you on D-deck.”

Roamer gave his superior a curt nod and a clipped “Yessir,” before offering the Jedi an awkwardly-accepted salute and heading off toward the exit.

Hash turned his attention fully to his superior, and gestured toward one of the nearby tables, indicating that the young one should sit.

“I’ll have that word with the cooks. Please, sir, take a load off.”

Mar smiled, reaching a hand into a shoulder bag, and did as he suggested. As she sat down, she retrieved a pristine block of bound flimsiplast from the bag and set it down on the table. The clone gave the book a curious look, but kept quiet. Such things were rare - especially for grunts like himself. He decided he would ask her about it on his return from the kitchen.

The cooks looked up from their work as he approached, setting down pots and pans to turn their attention to him. Recognising his higher rank, and knowing his status as a veteran, he was afforded respect not often offered between clones - one or two saluted him. These ‘shinies’ were fresh out of Kamino basic training, and no doubt restless working in the kitchens of a non-combat ship.

One nudged his buddy, “Hey, one-seven, check it out: commando.”

“Captain. What can we do for you?” the other asked, eagerly moving out from the kitchen and over to the counter.

“We were just closing up for the evening, sir, but if you and the General were still looking to eat, I’m sure we can rustle something up,” intervened another, more senior man with oiled-back hair. He was a little less impressed than the others, but still gave Hash a smile.

“Oh, don’t go out of your way for us. What’s left over? Just give us that.”

The galley chief finished polishing a cup, set it down on top of the counter and gave a nod toward his other client, “I’m sure clone slop won’t bother you, but all the executive meals are gone. Are you sure the General won’t...you know?”

Hash gave a glance back at the Jedi, who still sat at the table poring over her book.

“I don’t think the General cares too much.”

“That’s true, I suppose. She hasn’t eaten down here before. We don’t often get big-wigs like yourself.”

“Come now, chief. I’m just another clone.”

“If you’re anything as good as I hear, you commandos could practically win the war yourselves. Go ahead and sit, we’ll bring you and the General your food as soon as it’s ready.”

“Much obliged, chief...?”

“Foss.”

“Foss. Thank you.”

Hash smiled, shook the man’s hand and walked back to the table.

Zelhom Mar didn’t look up immediately as he returned, and for a second Hash was caught in a social trap he’d rarely encountered. Socialising with his brethren, there was never an awkward gap - their timing was always perfectly coordinated. Certainly none of them had ever taken time to complete their reading of a paragraph from a book.

After a moment, Mar looked up from the pages, grinned, and ran her finger down the page to mark her progress with the magnetic marker clip attached to the side. She closed the book and met the clone’s curious eyes.

He was briefly caught off guard, “Ah...food will be just a minute, General.”

“That’s quite alright, Captain Hash.”

“What are you reading?”

“It’s the _Rammahgon_ \- or at least, a copy of it.”

“...what’s that?”

“An ancient Jedi text. It’s...quite dry, if I am truly honest. But Master Arraira swore to me that I’d find something of value in it...”

“What’s it about?”

“It’s about...the Force. And where it might have come from. Or where people believe it might have come from, anyway. It’s a mix of theory, myth and...well, the part I’m at is a poem by Kli the Elder and it’s all about a tree as a metaphor for life...it’s all very...ah...esoteric.”

As Hash listened to the girl try to describe the book he was, more than ever, caught between viewing her as a superior and as an equal. The two of them were, by his reckoning, more or less the same age - but in their shared time existing in the same galaxy, he had never read a book. Manuals, equipment guides and military treatise aplenty, but never a book - certainly not one which contained poetry, nor one printed on flimsiplast. There was no time for that - not for a clone. Or at least, there was very little time that wasn’t already taken up by missions, training, briefings and debriefings, intelligence gathering, equipment inventorying and weapons maintenance. But the truth was that both he and Mar belonged to organisations where the potential to explore their autonomy was limited. The identities they had carved for themselves were built from scraps of discarded plastoid and ribbons of fabric, cobbled together with adhesive paste.

He had a name, just like her, but it was one appended to a number, given to him by other men who had also once been known only by a number. She’d possessed one from the moment she was born - on whatever planet the Jedi had taken her from. There was something binding about that shared lack of freedom.

Mar looked up from the table, which she had begun staring into in an attempt to conjure up the right words from her brain fog.

“I’m sorry, Captain. I don’t mean to bore you.”

“Not at all. It’s not something we clones get to think about much.”

“Have you ever felt it? The Force?”

The question took Hash aback - he’d never given the possibility a moment’s thought.

“I...don’t think so. What does it feel like?”

“That’s a good question,” the Padawan smiled, “What do you think it feels like?”

The soldier thought for a second, smirked, and returned, “I suppose I always pictured it as...a glow of some sort.”

“A glow?”

“Yeah. Like...an inside-glow.”

The Jedi smiled again, but weaker this time.

“That sounds nice. I...forget, these days. What it feels like, I mean.”

“Aren’t Jedi always in touch with the Force?”

“I’m no Jedi,” she replied, glumly, “Not yet, anyway. I’m just a learner.”

Hash detected her sadness, felt it, and, with a smile, reached out to comfort her with a gentle tap of his hand on her arm.

“Makes no difference to us, General.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yeah...I'm really bad at posting. I've been sitting on this chapter for a while, now, and finally figured it was time to release it. think I just needed some time to get perspective on it - ty to my couple beta readers, too. 
> 
> hopefully this'll put me on a roll, and I'll get round to posting the other chapters soon, since I already have them written, but I'm still working out the tail end of this story, so want to at least get the broad strokes of that down before I start putting pressure on myself to finish it!
> 
> anyway, enjoy! if you read and enjoyed, hmu in the comments!


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